The WIRELESS HOME DIGITAL INTERFACE (WHDI) is a wireless standard proposed for a wireless multimedia device network, which may be used at home, in the office or in other short-range wireless network environments. WHDI allows for high bandwidth wireless channels for sending content between devices, which may support uncompressed High Definition (HD) content. For example, a DVD player may be connected to multiple HDTVs wirelessly and send uncompressed content to the HDTVs using WHDI. WHDI eliminates the need for cabling, such as High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) cables, component cables, etc., used to transmit uncompressed content between devices. Conventional wireless technologies such as 802.11, BLUETOOTH, etc., do not have the bandwidth or interface to transmit uncompressed multimedia content between devices.
WHDI can be used in various environments. For example, a user located in a single family home or in an apartment may connect a DVD player, an MP3 player, a laptop/notebook or desktop personal computer (PC), a gaming console, and flat panel TVs all together, wirelessly, using WHDI. In another environment, a user wirelessly connects a multimedia projector in a conference room to a desktop PC in his office, and to a set of notebook computers of numerous meeting participants using WHDI. In these examples and other examples, security is a concern because of the wireless communication between the WHDI devices. Due to the nature of wireless networks, typically they are easy to identify by unauthorized users. Also, an unauthorized user may attempt to identify and connect to the particular devices connected in a home WHDI network.
The homeowner may desire to keep the identity of their devices private and their devices away from the unauthorized users. For example, a homeowner may not want a neighbor to know they have five HDTVs, or they may not want any non-family members to know they have a server connected to their home network because the server may contain confidential information, such as personal videos, etc. While WHDI provides the protocol and interfaces for high-bandwidth wireless networks, WHDI may lack the security procedures to maintain user privacy. The present invention provides methods of protecting a user's privacy based on the user's current needs for using the WHDI devices in a WHDI network.